Tom Letourneau: Milking the taxpayers

Tuesday

Jan 7, 2014 at 4:03 PM

Some argue that we need to further extend unemployment benefits to the millions who have milked it to the very end. Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Labor revealed that, in 2013, it improperly paid an estimated $7.7 billion in taxpayer funds to unem

Some argue that we need to further extend unemployment benefits to the millions who have milked it to the very end. Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Labor revealed that, in 2013, it improperly paid an estimated $7.7 billion in taxpayer funds to unemployment Insurance beneficiaries, including $7.3 billion worth of over-payments.

I have a friend in Nice, France, who was laid off from his job. He told me he was not worried because he was eligible for unemployment benefits for up to 18 months, at almost full pay. In other words: Why work when the government will pay me almost as much for not working?

Let us not fool ourselves. While many today are unemployed and want to find work, one cannot help but wonder how many are taking advantage of the system for all its worth.

This morning, I was reading one of Robert Ludlum's last books, "The Apocalypse Watch." In it, a fictitious conservative senator is under constant attack by the liberal press and his fellow liberal members of the Senate because of a statement he made: "When government did too much for the people, they did too little for themselves."